The Painting:
Home Fields (1885)
Early in the summer of 1885, after several years in Paris, Sargent returned to England. He spent the summer in the Cotswold village of Broadway, in Worcestershire, for a summer retreat for a group of young British and American artists.
Sargent found the artistic climate of Broadway a relief after the uncertainties and strictures of his career as a portraitist, and he relished the freedom of landscape painting. Home Fields, was painted during that summer, it is clear evidence of Sargent’s increasing interest in Impressionism. He would paint outdoors, setting his easel down anywhere, painting without previous conceptions or planning. 
The fence in the foreground is rendered in a series of ragged rush-strokes, leading the eye to a shimmering patchwork of greens, oranges, and blue-greys. The concern with the effects of light and the bright-hued palette places the painting squarely in the context of Impressionism.
WHY is this painting important? John Singer Sargent felt a sense of freedom and had a passion for landscape paintings. It was a way for him to escape the world of portrait painting. But, relatively few of Sargent's landscapes survive. He would often paint over his landscape sketches as soon as the paint was dry. The painting Home Fields (c1885) was given to Sargents friend and English artist Frank Bramley, inscribed and signed bottom left: To my friend Bramley/John S. Sargent.
Artist:
John Singer Sargent
(January 12, 1856 – April 14, 1925)
John Singer Sargent was the 2nd child of Fitzwilliam Sargent, an eye doctor from Philadelphia and Mary Newbold Singer, both of whom were American Citizens. John’s older sister died when she was two years old and his mother wanted to move abroad to recover. Fitzwilliam and Mary would travel regularly with the seasons to the sea and the mountain resorts in France, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland. John Singer Sargent was born in Florence, Italy on January 12, 1856.
From his early youth, John Sargent showed evidence of his gift in art as he kept sketchbooks recording his family’s travels. At thirteen, his mother reported that John "sketches quite nicely, & has a remarkably quick and correct eye. If we could afford to give him really good lessons, he would soon be quite a little artist." At age thirteen, he received some watercolor lessons in Rome from Carl Welsch, a German landscape painter. He received instruction in the private studio of Carolus Duran, a fashionable Parisian portrait artist, whose elegance and dashingly fluid manner made an impression on his student. In 1874, on the first attempt, Sargent passed a rigorous exam and gained admission to the Eccole des Beaux-Arts, a prestigious Art School in Paris, he also spent much of his free time in free study, drawing in museums and painting in a studio he shared. He is described as ‘an American born in Italy, educated in France, who looks like a German, speaks like an Englishman, and paints like a Spaniard’ (William Starkweather, ‘The Art of John S. Sargent’, October 1924). Sargent was fluent in French, Italian, and German.
His technique followed the tradition of Diego Velazquez (whom he deeply admired) and Manet, with the VIRTUOSO brush-stroke, painting directly with a loaded brush and utilizing instead of concealing the brush marks. His early passion was for Ladscapes, bur with Duran’s influence in portraits, Sargent followed that path. Portrait painting, on the other hand, was the best way of promoting an art career, getting exhibited in the Salon, and gaining commissions to earn a livelihood.
After a trip to Spain, Sargent became entranced with Spanish music and dance. The trip also re-awakened his own talent for music, which was nearly equal to his artistic talent. Music would continue to play a major part in his social life as well, as he was a skillful accompanist of both amateur and professional musicians. By the time John Sargent was 22 he had gained an honorable mention in the Salon of 1878.
The portrait of Madame Pierre Gautreau, (Madam X) exhibited at the Salon of 1884, was what secured his fame with the scandal that it was to be provocative and erotic in character. This painting is now considered to be one of his best works, and is the Artists personal favorite (as he stated in 1915). The model was a well-known professional beauty and Sargent exploited her candid worldliness in his daring manner. Madame Gautreau’s mother wrote to Sargent asking him to withdraw the portrait that she said made her daughter a laughing-stock. This scandal persuaded Sargent to move to London where he remained for the rest of his life.
His fine manners, perfect French, and great skill made him a standout among the newer portraitists, and his fame quickly spread. He confidently set high prices and turned down unsatisfactory sitters. With high society clamoring to be painted, Sargent was basking in his fame as the most brilliant of the American turn-of-the-century painters. His paintings are described as if he held up a mirror to the rich so that ‘looking at his portraits, they understood at last how rich they really were’. Sargent's best portraits reveal the individuality and personality of the sitters. After securing a commission through negotiations which he carried out himself, Sargent would visit the client's home to see where the painting was to hang. He would often review a client's wardrobe to pick suitable attire. Some portraits were done in the client's home, but more often in his studio, which was well-stocked with furniture and background materials he chose for proper effect.
In 1897 he was elected to the National Academy in New York, The Royal Academy in London, and made an officer of the Legion d’Honneur in Paris. He was traveling to America to paint portraits for people and in 1890, while there he agreed to paint series of murals for the Boston Public Library.
Sargent wanted to abandon the compromising activity of portrait painting, but portraits and the murals he did in America is what he is most commonly known for. Landscapes is where Sargent’s passion was because he felt a freedom. Sargent is usually thought of as an Impressionist painter. As Monet later stated, "He is not an Impressionist in the sense that we use the word, he is too much under the influence of Carolus-Duran.” He spent much time painting outdoors in the English countryside.
During his career, he created roughly 900 oil paintings and more than 2,000 watercolors, as well as countless sketches and charcoal drawings.
Sargent died in April 1925 in London. He had achieved such distinction in society that he had a memorial service in Westminster Abbey.
Current Location:
Date c. 1885
Medium Oil on Canvas
Dimensions 28 3/4 x 38 in. / 73.0 x 96.5 cm
Provenance John Singer Sargent to Frank Bramley, Worcestershire, England, until 1920
sold at Christie's London, May 28, 1920, lot 131
M. Knoedler & Co., New York, 1920 (lot no. 15064)
John Levy Galleries, New York, May 1921 DIA in 1921.
So, I am not really interested in making a trip to Detroit to see Home Fields in person, however I am interested in making a trip out to Cotswold village of Broadway, in Worcestershire,UK to see the actual place Sargent was inspired to paint this Landscape while at the Artist Retreat. Maybe it is because I fell in love with the beauty and history over there this past summer while in Ireland.
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